The Board of Education this week honored Bethann Canada, director of educational information management with the Virginia Department of Education, for receiving the 2006 Data Quality Campaign Leadership Award. The Data Quality Campaign is a national effort to improve the collection, availability, and use of high-quality education data, and implement state longitudinal data systems to improve instruction and raise student achievement.

"I believe Virginia stands out among states because, in addition to providing data for accountability and policy-making, we have a commitment to provide data to the practitioners, including principals and teachers, who can use student achievement information on a daily basis to improve instruction for all of our students," Ms. Canada said.

"Bethann's efforts have touched every school and every student in the commonwealth," said Board of Education President Mark E. Emblidge in presenting the board's resolution praising Ms. Canada's achievements.

In selecting Ms. Canada for the award, the Data Quality Campaign described her as a pioneer in the field of data quality and an acknowledged expert on data sharing and use.

Ms. Canada's achievements include the development and implementation of the commonwealth's Educational Information Management System (EIMS). The system provides decision-support data to educators at the state, division, and school levels to help them tailor instruction to student needs. The General Assembly has supported the development of the system through the appropriation of more than $13 million since 2004.

EIMS also enables the commonwealth and its public schools to meet the reporting requirements of the federal No Child Left Behind Act and is providing a model for other states in the nationwide effort to calculate more accurate graduation and dropout rates that fully account for student mobility and other factors.